


Of Violins and Heartstrings

by moonstone1520



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Awesome Molly Hooper, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Sherlock Holmes Has Feelings, Unresolved Romantic Tension, Warm and Fuzzy Feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-23
Updated: 2016-03-23
Packaged: 2018-05-28 13:04:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,387
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6330343
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moonstone1520/pseuds/moonstone1520
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The violin playing suddenly ceased and Molly let out a small sigh of relief. She’s had Sherlock hole up in her bedroom before, and for longer than this, but three straight days of violin playing was beginning to wear on her nerves.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Of Violins and Heartstrings

The violin playing suddenly ceased and Molly let out a small sigh of relief. She’s had Sherlock hole up in her bedroom before, and for longer than this, but _three straight days_ of violin playing was beginning to wear on her nerves. He’d arrived shortly after the Watson’s wedding, announced he was taking over her bedroom, and could count on one hand the number of times she’s seen him emerge since. Luckily, Tom was away on business, or she would have had some serious explaining to do. The sun glinted off her ring, casting rainbows onto the walls. She ignored the odd weight that settled in the pit of her stomach.

                “Oh Molly, I’ll be stopping by Bart’s later this afternoon. Need a liver and an appendix, if you can spare them.” The man himself appeared in her hallway, fastening his cuffs before pulling on his Belstaff.

                “I—I’ll see if we have any in,” she stammered as he pulled open her front door.

                “You do, I checked!” he shot back over his shoulder, making his way down the stairs. She chased after him, her annoyance level rising.

                “Sherlock!”

                He stopped and looked up at her, his brow furrowed with confusion. Molly crossed her arms and waited, cocking an eyebrow. After a beat, his expression cleared and he had the decency to look suitably abashed.

                “I, um… thank you, Molly,” he murmured, avoiding her gaze, “for allowing me the use of your room.”

                A smile crept onto Molly’s face. “Of course, Sherlock.” He nodded up at her and continued his way down. She sighed and returned to her flat, closing the door behind her. She bit her lip in anticipation and rushed to her bedroom, ignoring the mess the consulting detective left behind. She rummaged in her closet until she found what she was looking for, and brought it into her living room.

                She set the case down on her coffee table and opened it, reverently holding the instrument in front of her. Molly would never be at Sherlock’s level when it came to the violin, but that didn’t stop her enjoyment of playing. She pulled out her music stand from behind the bookshelf, rubbed the bow with resin and placed the instrument under her chin.

                Her teacher said she was coming along beautifully, and Molly knew it—the neighbors above, below and next to her no longer pounded on their connecting surfaces, demanding that she stop. She giggled at the memory of Mr. Sutton next door coming around after Sherlock left one day, having used her flat as a bolt hole, confused as to why the violin playing he’d heard constantly for two days had suddenly and abruptly decreased in skill. She’d had to make up a lie about Tom being a musician, as it was during the time that Sherlock was supposed to be dead. It made the memory all the more amusing, as Tom didn’t have a musical bone in his body.

                _He always misses something_ , she mused, smirking to herself. It was one of her private pleasures, and Molly would be damned if she’d let anyone take it away from her. She didn’t want to be compared to Sherlock as, in this, and in so many other areas, she knew she wouldn’t measure up.

                Molly pressed the “play” button on her waiting laptop and tapped her foot as piano accompaniment filled the room. She closed her eyes as her smile widened, the joy of playing filling her entire being. She’d practiced the song so often, she had it memorized, and she closed her eyes as she began to play. So it was no surprise that she missed the door to her flat opening.

                She hit a wrong note and swore under her breath, turning around to restart the piano accompaniment. She startled and almost dropped both the bow and the instrument when she saw Sherlock standing in her doorway, staring at her with an expression she couldn’t quite read.

                “Sherlock!” she breathed. _Damn it, I’m found out_. “Did you forget something?”

                He stared at her, and Molly felt her face flushing. She realized the music was still playing and she hurriedly shut it off. The silence that filled the flat was horribly loud.

                “Sherlock?”

                “Your posture. It’s… wrong.” Molly flinched a bit.

                “Wrong?”

                Sherlock cringed. “Probably a poor choice of words.”

                “Yeah, a bit,” Molly replied as he approached her slowly.

                “Sorry,” he murmured. Molly did a double take. Did Sherlock Holmes just… _apologize?_ He stood in front of her and held out his hands. “May I?”

                Molly extended the violin and bow to him, but he smiled and inched closer, placing one hand flat on her upper back and the other lightly on her stomach. Butterflies the size of moths exploded in her belly at his touch. _Oh, shit_.

                “Put the violin under your chin,” he whispered, moving behind her so she couldn’t see him. Heart pounding, she did as he asked.

                “Now, play.” Molly took a breath, closed her eyes, and moved the bow across the strings. The strains of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” echoed throughout the small flat. Sherlock pushed his hand gently against Molly’s upper back, and braced his other against her stomach, straightening her spine. “Good.” His hands glided from her stomach and back to her elbows, gently rearranging the positions of both. Instantly, the strain that Molly had been feeling in her wrists and elbows began to ease.

                “Keep playing.” His voice in her ear sent shivers down Molly’s spine, and she fought to suppress the shudder the warm baritone elicited. His hands moved from her elbows to her shoulders, gently pushing and squeezing, sending sparks all throughout her body. “Relax, Molly,” he murmured.

                _Easy for you to say_ , she thought. But she felt her body melting under his touch, the tension releasing from her neck and shoulders. Her teacher never could quite get Molly to relax, and Sherlock’s touch had done in five minutes what Molly had been unable to do during two years of lessons.

                The song drew to a close and Molly and Sherlock stood together, frozen in the moment. She felt his breath on her neck, tickling the tendrils of hair at her nape. His hands still rested on her shoulders, though they had stopped performing that marvelous massage the second the song had ended. Slowly, afraid to break the spell, Molly drew her instrument away from her chin and turned towards him.

                “Better?” she asked. Their faces were so close, all she had to do was move an inch forward and their lips would meet. He appeared to have the same thought, as his eyes flicked down to her mouth.

                “Better,” he whispered. Tension swirled between them. Molly’s heart felt like it was going to beat out of her chest. Sherlock’s pupils were blown, the ring of green barely visible. Molly swore that Sherlock moved closer when Toby, in a running fit, scampered around her legs, causing Molly to stumble. She fell against Sherlock, her hand coming up to his shoulder to brace herself. His arms wrapped around her waist to catch her. Her engagement ring caught the sunlight again, the diamond sparkling. Sherlock glanced at it, hummed and smiled sadly, his gaze ticking over to Molly’s face. She bit her lip in reply as she righted herself.

                “Much better,” he said. He leaned forwards and gently kissed her on the cheek, her heart splintering all over again like it did that day in the hallway. He removed her hand from his shoulder and made his way towards the door. After a beat, Molly remembered herself and turned towards him.

                “Sherlock?” He turned, his hand on her doorknob. “Did you need something?” _Do you need me?_ His brow furrowed as he struggled to remember why he returned to Molly’s flat.

                “I did… but, oddly enough I can’t seem to remember what. I’ll text you if I do,” he said, his tone confused. He looked off into the distance. “There’s always something.” He glanced over at Molly, smiled and left her flat, leaving her alone in her sitting room, her violin dangling limply from her hands.

                “There’s always something,” she agreed, a smile toying at the corner of her lips, as she packed the instrument away and made to get ready for work.

**Author's Note:**

> The song I imagine Molly playing at the beginning is "The Best Day of My Life" by American Authors. The video that inspired this, along with the video of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" can be found here:  
> http://takelessons.com/blog/easy-violin-songs-z08
> 
> I'm a musician, but not a violinist, so I apologize if I got anything wrong!
> 
> PS: follow me on Tumblr!*  
> *user name is the same as author name.


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